


Mind Your Language (There Are Children Present!)

by reedenryete



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Crack, Humor, M/M, One Shot, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-07
Updated: 2014-06-07
Packaged: 2018-02-03 17:52:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1753509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reedenryete/pseuds/reedenryete
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Third-Year students Draco and Harry froze in a ridiculous picture -- Draco gripping Harry harshly by the collar of his robes and Harry pausing mid-punch with his fist just inches away from Draco’s face -- when their thirty-something-year-old selves fell from the sky in a stumbling heap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mind Your Language (There Are Children Present!)

**Title:** “Mind Your Language (There are Children Present!)”  
 **Rating:**  PG-13  
 **Pairing:**  Harry/Draco  
 **Summary:**  Third-Year students Draco and Harry froze in a ridiculous picture -- Draco gripping Harry harshly by the collar of his robes and Harry pausing mid-punch with his fist just inches away from Draco’s face -- when their thirty-something-year-old selves fell from the sky in a stumbling heap.  
 **Word Count: 3,200+**  
 **Warnings:**  A bit of crack, featuring a painfully oblivious young!Harry.

 

 

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It was the sudden crash that tore their attention away from tearing into each other’s throats.  
  
As usual, their bickering after Potions class started off with something small. Either Harry had bumped into Draco, or Draco had purposefully elbowed Harry -- the story changed depending on which boy told it -- and somehow the two of them ended up fist fighting in the middle of an empty hallway.  
  
A pop crackled into the air and a whirring portal whooshed open and zipped close, taking all of their fight with it.  
  
Draco and Harry whipped their heads toward the other end of the corridor.  
  
A thud accompanied by two grunts clunked on the stone ground.  
  
Within an instant, those two grunts twisted into a squabble, two raspy voices deepened and hardy, strange but oddly familiar.  
  
“This is all your fault! I told you we shouldn’t have been fooling around at work!”  
  
“How was I supposed to know that we were leaning against some sort of giant Time-Turner--“  
  
Draco felt the warmth drain from his face and he suppressed a surprised choke, while Harry felt his eyes bulge and his jaw dropped into a wordless wheeze.  
  
Lying not even 10 feet in front of them were two people they had never met, but knew their entire lives.  
  
They looked like Draco and Harry. But they  _weren’t_. If the whispers of wrinkles lining their faces and the hints of white strands shining in their hair were any indication, they were in their mid-30s. And while coming face-to-face with your future self was alarming enough, it was the position they found themselves in that slapped young Draco and Harry into a stunned silence.  
  
“We were in the Department of Unknown Magical Artifacts, for goodness’ sake!” The green-eyed man exhaled noisily. He scowled up at the man propped over him, his hands gripping the blond’s shirt as if he had instinctively held onto him to break his fall.  
  
“No need to yell. I’m right in front of you,” the blond droned in response, an easily recognizable frown marring his features. He held himself up on his elbows, hovering on top of the other, while his hands almost protectively cushioned the head of the black-haired man beneath him.  
  
Young Draco and Harry snapped their faces back to one another and away from the pair that seemed to fall from the sky out of nowhere. With mirrored expressions of confusion, both boys found truce in this bizarre situation.  
  
They may have been dumbfounded, but they knew one thing for sure: Draco thought his older self looked  _too_  pleased to find Potter lying underneath him and Harry thought his older self looked  _too_  comfortable to have Malfoy lying above him. Shouldn’t they be struggling against each other by now?  
  
“We should have just waited until we got home! Now we don’t even know where we are!”  
  
“Forgive me, you didn’t seem to be complaining. I had no an idea that your legs wrapped around my waist and you snogging my face were the universal signs of protest. I’ll be sure to hire a fluent Potter translator as soon as possible to prevent further errors in communication.”  
  
The bespectacled man heaved a deep sigh and tilted his head back, the crown of it touching the ground in a great show of exasperation. He rolled his eyes, but his retort died on the tip of his tongue, suddenly realizing they were not alone.  
  
Thirty-five-year-old Harry stiffened.  
  
“What is the matter with--“ Draco begun tersely when he felt the abrupt tenseness in the other man’s muscles, lifting his head up to match the direction Harry was looking. He froze.  
  
Their audience painted the perfect caricature. Two statues immobilized in the middle of a tousle. Grappled in one another’s embrace in a mockery of a tango, Draco was gripping Harry by the collar of his robes, and Harry had his fist only inches away from Draco’s face, paused at mid-punch. The boys gawked at them, Draco’s mug like a horrified ferret staring into the mouth of a Basilisk and Harry’s gape mimicking a dying goldfish gasping and struggling valiantly for air.  
  
Older Draco glanced below at Harry, who was ogling the boys upside-down from his spot on the floor, and then Draco looked back up to scrutinize the Hogwarts students, as if daring them to question anything.  
  
An eerie stillness blanketed the atmosphere.  
  
Long, quiet beats pounded between the four.  
  
“Um, hello,” older Harry, the first to speak, offered awkwardly. He pushed his slipping glasses up the bridge of his nose in a nervous gesture. A million excuses for his and Draco’s compromising position began bouncing across his mind.  
  
Apparently, that was all 13-year-old Draco needed to break out of his stupor.  
  
He shouted.  
  
“AAAHHH!”  
  
Beside him, the shocked, youthful Harry jerked to life. He yelled.  
  
The two boys clung onto each other screaming with as much blast as their lungs could muster.  
  
Older Harry, completely startled by the loud response to his greeting, hollered.  
  
“All of you  _shut up_  and stop your screeching!” Middle-aged Draco bellowed, although he was just as panicked as everyone else.  
  
They all clamped their mouths shut. Silence returned.  
  
After a few moments, the teenaged Draco cleared his throat.  
  
“Excuse me, we got here first and claimed this hallway to have a row, so you two can go somewhere else,” he said, although the threat in his voice and the narrowing of his eyes were weak. After fear, Draco’s instinctual reaction to the unknown was to be snarky.  
  
It was a trait he evidently hadn’t outgrown because older Draco sneered right back at him.  
  
“Ah, yes, Harry, to answer your previous question as to where we are,” he said while he got off the floor to dust himself off before he leaned over to help heft Harry to his feet, “it seems as though we’ve gone back in time to when I was ripe with adolescent angst over being rebuffed by the great Harry Potter.”  
  
Thirty-five-year-old Draco regarded his younger self dryly with a sidelong glance and quirked a brow at how the Slytherin boy still had a near chokehold on the baby-faced Harry. He smirked.  
  
“No, no, Draco. Word of advice, you shouldn’t do that. Harry isn’t fond of breath-play -- oof!”  
  
His taunt was cut short when the grown Harry Potter jibed a swift elbow into his rib. The two older men began muttering to each other in furious whispers.  
  
Third-year Draco gawked again.  _Breath-play?_  Had he grown up to be a  _pervert?_  
  
Young Harry, on the other hand, watched the elder pair with curiosity. His brows furrowed at their mannerisms. Their faces were close, surely close enough that their breaths puffed onto each other’s chins by how frenzied their grumbles were. Despite the fact they were undoubtedly quarrelling, it appeared rather…civil.  
  
Draco had grown taller than he had -- this Harry frowned at, although accepted with reluctance – and looked sharp for his age. He was lean, poised and dignified. Almost like Lucius, but he was missing a vicious edge to him. It was as if Malfoy had softened over the years, but that was something Harry wasn’t willing to bet on.  
  
He shifted his gaze toward the other Harry. At the very least, if he got that old, it must have meant Voldemort didn’t manage to kill him. That had to be good, right? And he seemed to be quite fit, too, hopefully from years of playing Quidditch, not running away from Dark Wizards. Although his hair was still impossibly messy and disarrayed…but wait…what was that?  
  
“Are you okay?” Juvenile Harry asked, finally speaking his first words since the entire encounter.  
  
The elder Draco and Harry took a break from their spat to turn toward him.  
  
“Are you okay?” Harry asked again with genuine concern, locking eyes with his double. “Does it hurt? I – er, I mean, it looks a bit painful.”  
  
Thirty-five-year-old Harry tilted his head in puzzlement. Was he always so vague as a child?  
  
“Does what hurt?” He asked.  
  
Third-year Harry pointed at the man’s neck. It was rosy and peppered with bruises, some deeper than others, especially at the crook of his collarbone and by his ear.  
  
“Did Malfoy get you pretty good while you were fighting?”  
  
Malfoy stifled a bark of laughter, while the Harry in question yelped and slapped a palm over his throat.  
  
Hogwarts Draco felt his eyes boggle.  
  
“What the -- Potter, are you  _daft?_ ” He squawked indignantly, face blushing once he fully took in the appearance of the two men. The feverish flush, the slick sheen of sweat, the abused lips, the crumpled clothing, the mismatched buttons -- honestly, had the Boy-Who-Lived not learned a single thing about being a teenager from his time with Muggles?  
  
“He didn’t get those bruises on his neck from  _fighting,_  he got them from--!“  
  
Draco was quickly pinned with a glare from the older Harry -- angry green eyes he was accustomed to seeing, but for some reason were more frightening with age -- as if to say  _don’t you dare tell 13-year-old Harry anything that would torment his poor, innocent mind._  
  
“--Cooking,” Draco finished lamely under the guise of a cough.  
  
This time other Draco did not hold back his snort.  
  
“Was I always this wrapped around your finger, Potter?”  
  
“What? I am not wrapped around  _anyone’s_  finger!” Third-year Draco hissed.  
  
“Yes, you are. Merely for one person, though. I know you. I know everything about you,” the man goaded him.  
  
“You infuriating, pompous--”  
  
“Enough. One Malfoy was plenty, but now two? I’m getting a massive headache,” Older Harry sighed as he massaged his temples. “See why you will never have a fan club? You can’t even stand yourself.”  
  
“Hey!” Both Draco’s snarled, affronted.  
  
Thirteen-year-old Harry snickered behind a hand.  
  
Other Harry looked at him with a fond smile.  
  
“So, yes. As your Draco put it earlier,” Harry ignored the student’s whine of ‘he’s not  _my_ Draco’, “we were cooking. Or brewing potions, to be exact.”  
  
Both Draco’s looked at the thirty-five-year-old Harry disbelievingly, for once on the same page. If there were a list of things Harry Potter would voluntarily do without being held at wandpoint, brewing potions would not be one of them.  
  
“And…uh, the potions got hot. And bubbled. Uncontrollably. And then they splashed on my neck and I got burnt--”  
  
“Oh, please, Potter. The only thing that was hot and brewing between us was--“  
  
“ _Draco._ ”  
  
“But why aren’t you trying to kill him?” Third-year Harry asked, missing the double entendre and cutting into their next impending argument. He blinked up at the other Draco, honestly baffled.  
  
(Older Harry glanced at the teenaged Draco because his younger self was busy addressing his Draco.  
  
“Did I always ask so many questions?”  
  
“You just asked me another question, so maybe you didn’t outgrow that habit,” young Draco pointed out.  
  
Older Harry glowered at him.)  
  
An impish grin laced onto the pureblood’s lips. He wrapped an all-too-friendly arm around the elder brunet’s shoulders, all the while tutting at the teenage Harry.  
  
“Well, you see, killing Scarhead over here would be counterproductive to certain needs I have. And certain needs ‘Draco Junior’ has, and by ‘Draco Junior,’ I am not referring to the prepubescent git standing next to you.”  
  
“ _Draco!_ ”  
  
Young Draco paled and quashed the build up of bile that was rising up his throat. He covered his ears with both hands and shook his head furiously. No, no,  _no_ , he did not want to hear this. He  _had_  grown up to be a pervert. Mother wouldn’t be pleased at all.  
  
(Little did he know, Mother always reminded him to be an attentive lover and told him to focus on Potter’s pleasure before his own. She even gave him a few tips.)  
  
“Oh, okay.” Young Harry said softly. “In that case. I’m glad. Glad to see we’ve stopped fighting by the time we’ve reached your age. Fighting is getting very tiring.”  
  
He was unashamed and frank, as Gryffindor as could be.  
  
“I see. Fighting does get tiring, doesn’t it?” Thirty-five-year-old Draco hummed in thought. His eyes widened a fraction at the boy’s bare honesty, for once at loss as to what to say. His sarcastic remarks vanished in thin air. “I wish I learned you felt that way earlier.”  
  
Even teenaged Draco seemed surprised at Harry’s confession. But before he could even begin to consider why he had heard such a  _sadness_  in Potter’s voice, he was being dragged off.  
  
“Come boy,” his older self said with a Snape-like sternness, and pulled an unwilling Draco along by the ear, his feet sliding helplessly on the floor. “I need to have a word with you.”  
  
“Ow! Stop it! Wait until my father hears about this--!”  
  
“If you tell ‘your’ father anything about meeting me, he’ll think you’ve gone mad.”  
  
Middle-aged Harry exhaled, looking at the blond duo over his shoulder as they moved toward a corner. He shook his head and ran a hand through his hair, turning to his younger counterpart with a sheepish smile.  
  
“I bet you’re horribly confused, aren’t you?”  
  
“Er, yeah. Just a bit,” the other Harry admitted.  
  
A pause settled between them. The older Harry peered at him without saying a word, a knowing twinkle in his eyes. It reminded the young Harry of Dumbledore. That’s probably why his beard was so big. It was full of secrets.  
  
“What?” the youth burst out, slightly unnerved after long seconds of nothing.  
  
“Sorry, I just remembered something. Anyway, listen…” Harry began, kneeling in front of the kid and putting a reassuring hand over his shoulder.  
  
“I’m pretty sure if I tell you certain things now, you’re going to freak out and fight against it…and probably ruin it -- hey, don’t look at me like that. We’re quite talented at messing things up,” Harry chuckled at the offended grimace the thirteen-year-old had on his face.  
  
“Anyway, just let yourself be happy, okay? And things are not always what they seem…” Harry continued, glancing at the other Draco. “You’ll find out later what I mean.”  
  
His face had an expression young Harry could not read. He was watching Draco, not with the anger or annoyance that he associated Draco with, but with something he had never felt before. He stared at his future self, bemused.  
  
“Oh! Another tip. Remember to apologize right away. You’re -- we’re gonna end up doing a lot of stupid things,” Older Harry said while he rubbed the back of his neck with an embarrassed laugh. “And you might wanna read up on some pureblood traditions so you’re not…caught off guard later down the road.”  
  
Thirteen-year-old Harry ogled at him, but did not respond. The action of his older self’s uncomfortable fidgeting made something appear to glint in the light -- like silver on his ring finger. And although he had questions, he wasn’t sure if he was willing to open up that can of worms right away. Instead, he turned his attention to the twin set of Malfoys a few paces off.  
  
Young Draco was rooted to his spot, his face burning bright and his body rigid from the tips of his hair to the tips of his toes, as the other Draco whispered cheekily in his ear.  
  
“Why is he staring at me? And why is Malfoy’s face red? Is he plotting to kill me?” Third-year Harry asked, looking up at future Harry with legitimate worry.  
  
“What? No, of course not,” older Harry said, resisting the urge to facepalm. Had he always been this dense? He took a quick peep at the Malfoy in question and nearly pitied him. Draco probably hadn’t spared him any details.  
  
A few minutes later, future Draco gave a resounding clap onto his counterpart’s back, to which the younger boy answered with an ‘ack!’ and a glare.  
  
“Don’t forget behind the knees. Particularly ticklish area there. You might want to wait another five years before you try anything though. Around 18? He’ll be more receptive then. Off you go,” Draco said casually, pushing the teenage Draco forward, who was awkwardly shuffling back to the Harry of his time, trying to edge away from his future self.  
  
Middle-aged Draco walked up to his Harry with a self-satisfied smile.  
  
“Ah, this memory is much more fun from this end than back when we were in third year,” he said.  
  
“Wait, you remember this happening?” Harry asked him, the corners of his mouth twitching downward in confusion.  
  
“Of course, Potter. Time is cyclical after all. Now, we only have to wait five more minutes until the second portal comes back to take us home. I vaguely remember it showing up after this conversation.”  
  
“But that doesn’t make sense,” Harry huffed, “if time is cyclical and all that, how come you have this memory and I don’t?”  
  
Unseen by the Harry’s, future Draco sent the current Draco a sly wink over his shoulder.  
  
Thirteen-year-old Draco blushed again. His double taught him how to Obliviate this moment from Harry’s recollections, so by the time they started dating ( _Dating!_ ) in Eighth Year (That made him do a double-take -- since when did Hogwarts have an eighth year?), Harry would believe that Draco naturally knew all of his body’s sweet spots -- ear lobes, collar bone, behind the knees -- and not because he had enlisted the help of his future self.  
  
It was awful. It was manipulative. It was brilliantly Slytherin.  
  
“I don’t know, Potter,” older Draco provoked the man in order to change the subject, “How am I supposed to know the limits of how foolish you are?”  
  
“What the fuck?  _I’m_  foolish? Need I remind you that you were the one who got us stuck in this situation in the first place, Malfoy?”  
  
“It takes two hands to clap, Pottymouth. Although, I must say, the trip was certainly worth it. It was nice seeing you as adorably confused as ever. Don’t see that face much nowadays since you’ve grown up.”  
  
“ _Malfoy!_ ”  
  
The two boys turned away from the quarrel that was steadily looming, looking at each other uncertainly now that the two men were no longer paying them any attention.  
  
“Ugh, come on, Potter. This is too much magic, even for a pureblood wizard like me,” the teen said, his nose wrinkled in disgust, and then studied Harry calmly.  
  
Young Harry cocked his head to the side, gazing at Draco with raised brows. It was as if the blond was staring at him in a new light.  
  
…No, no, that was wrong. Draco had always looked at him like that. But Harry never…never really noticed. Hmm.  
  
“Yeah, let’s go.”  
  
Both boys rounded on their heels, the sounds of the two visitors arguing still echoing behind them. Their immature bickering lasted all the way until another time portal whisked them away to where they came.  
  
Honestly, though, how could those two be in their mid-30s if they acted that way, the two students wondered.  
  
Those men were such children.  


 

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**Author's Note:**

> This one-shot came from a quick, random thought I had before bed a few nights ago. Before I fell asleep, I was bit with the bug and the itch wouldn’t go away. I’m happy I finally had the time to scratch it. Haha, well, thank you for your time!


End file.
